This bit of the project hasn't been started yet, apart from an initial investigation by the riggers on possible structural defects on attachment points, It's probably the last thing that going to get done too!

Here's some photos of it anyway. It measures 24.5 Mtrs (about 80ft) top to toe.

I'll address the cosmetic issues and the easy stuff including sanding and repaint, I'll get the pro's in to do the rewire, nav, weather and electrics install.

Ok just learned how to post pics in a non linear fashion so bear with me!

Not sure if this will be helpful, but there is another thread on this forum entitled "Breaking all the Rules" which discusses the renovation of a 1987 50 foot AL boat build by Kanter. There is a lot of discussion with very little photos except of the finished project, but still the discussion may be useful. I think his idea was to turn a profit from doing the work on getting the boat at a bargain price . I found it curious that before and after photos were not given which would have been better documentation of his efforts.

Might have been good that you did not buy that Oyster considering the keel "problem". I was looking at Oysters in the late 90's when Mathews ran the company.

Not sure if this will be helpful, but there is another thread on this forum entitled "Breaking all the Rules" which discusses the renovation of a 1987 50 foot AL boat build by Kanter. There is a lot of discussion with very little photos except of the finished project, but still the discussion may be useful. I think his idea was to turn a profit from doing the work on getting the boat at a bargain price . I found it curious that before and after photos were not given which would have been better documentation of his efforts.

Might have been good that you did not buy that Oyster considering the keel "problem". I was looking at Oysters in the late 90's when Mathews ran the company.

Thanks Lancelot.
The boat was acquired at a good price alright, but not as an investment per-se. What I hope to achieve is 3-5 years good fun usage out of her, and for the project to be cost neutral... which is good enough in my books! The profit is in the fun we'll have achieving this! (Hopefully!)

Ok the engine room below decks is actually pretty tight for space, between a 150ltr hot water tank and three banks of 24v batteries in a 4 x 6v arrays, a genset, day tank, main engine, AC, heater and 30 years of random ' at sea fixes' and additional wiring, not including 'dead' items that have been left in situ.

This combined with the partial flooding of diesel and raw sewage from its last crossing with its previous owners and the overall mess customs left it in searching the yacht (they cracked all the dieseltanks and water tank">fresh water tank covers and cut all pipes to and from these to make access easier), really means that It's due a complete overhaul.

The wiring is a hazardous mess, and all the old soundproofing covering the whole engine bay has sort of petrified and crumbles into dust at the slightest touch, so the idea will be a complete dismantle item by item, clean, check, service/repair or replace.

The engine itself is a 120hp 6 cylinder Ford 'Dover' type, which is a pretty common engine (so I'm told) fitted to all ford cargo trucks and plenty of agricultural vehicles from 1981-1983 the basic engine was made available to several companies to 'marinize' with its own heat exgchangers, pumps etc. Mine is the watermota Sealion version, other companies who used this basic block and head from Ford were Mermaid and Lehman. The engine is showing only 2400 hrs on the clock which is pretty good, so I'm going to keep it.

However, with the main cause of failure in its last journey as a raw water intake pump, and a poorly jury rigged electric toilet pump to serve it at sea, there are two areas of concern, the primary one is of serious overheating, and perhaps scoring of the block, reduced compression etc etc, the second is the navy report the engine was completely seized at interception, due to being back flooded because of not enough exhaust pressure at sea, now we have had it running since I purchased it, but with a lot of heavy knocking, which doesn't bode well. We also have fuel feed issues from either dirty diesel and injectors or a broken mechanical diesel pump.

It's a massively heavy engine, and there is no possible way it has ever been taken out since the ships construction, even measuring the block after complete strip down, we can't fit it through the companionway without cutting aluminium to do so.

I also don't want to mess with the ships balance either, the engine is central and low down in the hull directly above the keel, I'm more than sure the dead weight was calculated into the build and contributes to overall sailing stability, to change it out for a more modern smaller, lighter and more powerful engine, could upset the ships karma.

So I'm going to lift it in situ so I can get underneath to the middle diesel tank inspectionhatch to clean that, and also to inspect the block for and cracks etc, as there seemed to be a lot of engine oil collected underneath it. (this could be due to me finding the dipstick in the bilge!) again another concern is that it has been run extensively without oil too.

Here's the engine lifted and place on spreader beams with the head stripped

Glad we did, final photo below shows the drive flex plate (or whats left of it), stuck to the starter gear, so she would have continued to give me major problems, and to fix it it would have been a lift out and gearboxremoval anyway.

Really after the name change, who is going to know it's history? I think that only becomes relevant if your looking to sell it, and even then, I have always believed right through my entire professional career, that honesty is the best policy.

In my sailing life i've moored next to some perfectly fine yachts with some despicable characters on board and vice versa! so there is no real indication of integrity being linked to yacht history.

Firstly let me start by saying if I was embarrassed or ashamed of this yachts history, I wouldn't be posting it on the largest cruising forum in the world! I have nothing to hide and neither has the yacht!

In reality the boat has led a charmed and fulfilled life on charter in the caribbean from 1985 to 2013, when a 70 yr old and his son decided to purchase it and do something illegal with it. Their total ownership of the vessel was for 4 months out of nearly 30 years! It's a colourful chapter in the boats history, nothing more than that!

If that puts you off, then that's your opinion, personally I think this is a great project, and its been on my bucket list to restore a sizeable yacht for many years. I do hear you on the 'go and buy one that's already sorted' vibe though. I did also consider changing the colour, but I've decided that the poor judgement of a couple of individuals shouldn't really dictate anything to do with the destiny of this yacht.

Sure I could go and buy a brand new Oyster if I wanted to, but I don't, and it's not the purpose of this exercise.

The purpose of this exercise is to restore/refit/update a fine custom built aluminium hull by a world renowned naval architect, which if you were to build from scratch today would cost in excess of $1.5 million. This vessel as it stands owes me less than 0.5% of that figure. I get to dictate what goes into her, more importantly I'm around when its installed, I oversee all work, and hopefully I'm left with a boat that I know 100% inside and out, that is a safe, capable ocean going vessel for me and my family to enjoy.

Sure the super structure is a little dated, and not to everyones taste, but nothing wrong with a little variety! and yes, it is on the large side, and without 'in-mast or 'in-boom' furling it will need more than 2 to sail it, but I don't like push button sailing, there's nothing wrong with it, it's just not me, and not how I or my family have ever sailed. For us sailing is enjoyable work, no professional crews, just competent family and friends, always!

There's nothing negative in my response to yours and love to hear everyones opinions otherwise I would be posting here!

I shall continue! Actually, just being new to the forum means I'm playing catch up with my posts, the vessel has been out and in refit since Sept 2015, so I have about 500 photo's of its progress to post.

Well I see you have wasted very little time and are into it full pelt, I'm impressed it takes a lot of heart plus money and ones productive time. It seems you and the boat are meant to be.

Now you have your mind made up - I See you have advanced to the engine tear down, eventhough you can't remove the engine I would cut a hole in the cabin top and remove it buy a short block with head replacment engine of the same type from an engineering company that does this for a Living. (It will be far cheaper then a rebuidl, including creating a hatch in the cabin roof)

I have have had rebuild engines most of my life and learned the hard way (expensive ), there is always a unforseen problem of wear that is missed - don't risk it, buy a short block with heads and new gear box while your at it. When you most need it you can't trust the rebuild of an old engine, it could cost you big time if it fails at the wrong but critical time.

Re boats reputation - Here is my experence - I change the colour of my boat from white with a red strip midd freeboard to all jay gray, still for the last 28 years people of all ages row by and ask me if that was the boat where the skipper was lost at sea in the round the worldrace,
I can't avoid it word follows me everywere.

The Bar flys around the world like to call talk about nothing but women and boats they spread the word of a boats history....you will discover sailors gosip is faster then lighting, you can't stop it no matter what you do as I discovered.

Also in Australia we had a drug bust on a boat called "Cloud 9". The new owners thought they got a good deal and like you invested segnificant time and money to change everything colour and boats name. Guess what? It is still known as a drug boat up and down the coast, that was bought for a song.

Boat had a Northern Lights 8kw genset showing @12,000 hrs on the clock, it was big and noisy. so I lifted it at the same time as the engine.

Here it is:

An here's the space left behind, you can see the overall poor state to the wiring and also the crusty foam heat shield/ sound proofing that will be being stripped out

Given that the overall planned usage on the boat was family cruising with kids and that the AC and general boat systems would be making pretty big demands on power draw, (the boat currency has three large fridges and a huge freezer) I have decided to completely replace the genset with a new model, larger capacity (12kw) and quieter with it own acoustic enclosure, I am also installing a silent exhaust water separator so evenings moored up aren't disturbed with the put put put of seawater out of the side of the boat.

Just found some more photo's prior to engine removal, you can see how customs just left the main diesel tank hatch open and off to one side when searching the ship. Also visible is the remnants of the garden hose 'jury rig' to try and feed the engine cool water whilst at sea.

They also used this 24v general utility pump until that gave up too.

It's an expensive pump with all brass innards so I have ordered a service kit for it to bring it back to life.

In terms of configuration, the keel only has about 1ft of lead in it at the bottom, the rest of the keel runs the length of the engine room and is hollow and acts as the main diesel tank for the ship, this is compartmentalised and divided into three large linear tanks via baffle walls with each tank having its own bolted inspection hatch plate. There is a massive amount of crap and sludge in these tanks which will need to be professionally cleaned, which is part of the reason I lifted the engine too,(the middle tank plate sits directly beneath the engine block) the equalisation holes in the baffle walls are two tiny 1" slits at the bottom, which is I guess all you need to balance fluid, but serve no purpose when trying to access the other compartments for cleaning, so each cover plate will have to come off to do it properly.

Here's a photo after we removed the prop shaft, you can still see the diesel spill pads i had pushed under it to try and soak up the last of the yuck!

I'd guess you're already thinking about redesigning that failed gooseneck fitting - have you found any more welds like that shocking mess in pic 5 of your mast series?

Haven't spotted any other poor welding in your photos - hard to believe the mast & boom were built or even passed as acceptable by the same yard that built the hull.

Enjoying watching your amazing progress, puts me to shame

Hi Unclemack

The welding on the mast is pretty scruffy alright! The trouble with it is that where it has been painted over there's lots of little cracks in the paint, so when we first stepped the mast it looked as if pretty much all the eyes were failing, and my heart really sank at the additional work and cost that was going to bring. Fortunately after rough sanding the paint out the way, all the welds were found to be structurally sound, which was a relief to say the least.

I haven't fortunately found anywhere else of concern (yet!), there is a good bit of panel depression/ denting on the bow under the waterline ( its almost impossible to photograph as they are just large depressions, you can only feel them when you run your hand over them)
But I have had the hull inspected and we had a good look at them from inside the forward sail locker ( which is a watertight bulkhead too) and there are no stress fractures on any of the welds, the guys used an engineering dye and a UV lamp to show up any fractures and all were found to have held solid. I guess she has encountered some big seas in her life, and these have occurred where she has slammed hard down onto waves that has created the depressions. I try and take some photos to articulate what I mean.

Haven't really addressed the gooseneck yet, there isn't space for a vang either under the boom, the angle is just too sharp for it to be of any use. I guess she must have crash jibed as some stage without the preventer being hooked up which has caused a lateral fracture in the shoulder? That's my theory anyway.

Here's some more pics of the fracture, I haven't cleaned it back yet to investigate the overall seriousness, but I doubt its going to be a paint crack! (almost dreading doing it!)

Here some pictures of other boats in the yard sheds. I particularly like the Cork class 1 design from the 1920's, it's a proper gentleman's racing yacht, almost like a mini J type!, very graceful lines. The shipwright is doing an amazing job on the teak deck, proper 3/4inch cross-sawn burmese teak. Amazing job.